Huhne will use Fukushima report to revive nuclear programme

Under attack from Greenpeace, Huhne will hope to counter setbacks as companies pull back from nuclear and threaten to abandon carbon capture and storage. Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Guardian

The government is expected this week to try to use a post-Fukushima green light from Britain's chief nuclear safety inspector to inject momentum into its stuttering nuclear power and anti-climate-change programmes.

The move will run into a hail of criticism from environmentalists who believe the latest inquiry into the nuclear industry has been rushed through and fear that ministers are backing off from their commitments to green issues.

On Tuesday, Chris Huhne, the energy secretary, is scheduled to release the final report by Mike Weightman, chief inspector for nuclear installations, into what lessons should be learned from the Fukushima reactor disaster in Japan. The report is understood to contain only small amendments to an earlier, interim, report which made only minor recommendations.

An upbeat message from Huhne will be aimed at countering a series of setbacks in the energy sector as deteriorating financial conditions encourage companies to pull back from nuclear and threaten to abandon carbon capture and storage (CCS) programmes. He will also want to convince critics that his Tory coalition partners are not trying to undermine the low-carbon agenda by arguing Britain can no longer afford it.

Greenpeace is already pursuing a judicial review for alleged insufficient lack of consultation on nuclear power, and has been further antagonised by a perceived lack of transparency over submissions made to Weightman.

Anti-nuclear protesters are infuriated that EDF, the French state-owned energy company at the heart of the UK's new nuclear plans, has started preparatory work on a facility at Hinkley Point in Somerset ahead of the report's publication.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change insisted no one had jumped the gun with new projects and said it would still take into account any changes or demands made by the final report.

It denied that the government's hold on nuclear or wider energy policy was slipping, pointing out, for example, that although the power company SSE wants to sell its stake in Sellafield, it would be taken over by another operator.

Greenpeace said the Weightman report "pre-empted" many of the lessons from Fukushima, which could only be learned a year or 18 months down the line. The campaign group also points out that Weightman promised "to publish all submissions on the Office of Nuclear Regulation website as they are received", which has yet to happen.

But Charles Hendry, the energy minister, told a fringe meeting that people were still behind atomic power.

"Fukushima was a massive wake-up call and reminds us we can never rely on just one technology," he said. "But on public opinion, it has been quite extraordinary to see the reaction since Fukushima. A number of opinion polls have shown that support has risen. There is more support than in France, and more political consensus, which is quite remarkable."

• This article was amended on 20 October 2011 to correctly locate Hinkley Point in Somerset, not Kent.